Diamond model applied to Vic3

[IsaacCAT]

I would like to share with you this analysis with the Diamond model of a MP game of Victoria 3:

Setup: six players in three different markets, year 1898. Players have been distributed in three teams but apart from that they have been playing the most competitive as possible.

Spoiler: Market Map

Spoiler: Market Prices Comparison

Year	Type	Good	American Market Price	Russian Market Price	French Market Price
1898​	Industrial	Clippers	-41%​	36%​	-36%​
1898​	Industrial	Coal	0%​	1%​	13%​
1898​	Industrial	Dye	5%​	8%​	17%​
1898​	Industrial	Engines	-13%​	0%​	-7%​
1898​	Industrial	Explosives	11%​	-3%​	-4%​
1898​	Industrial	Fertilizer	-50%​	-15%​	2%​
1898​	Industrial	Glass	0%​	-8%​	13%​
1898​	Industrial	Hardwood	-7%​	27%​	31%​
1898​	Industrial	Iron	8%​	8%​	4%​
1898​	Industrial	Lead	1%​	0%​	14%​
1898​	Industrial	Oil	18%​	21%​	-64%​
1898​	Industrial	Rubber	-40%​		-44%​
1898​	Industrial	Silk	33%​	-5%​	23%​
1898​	Industrial	Steamers	-58%​	-32%​	-48%​
1898​	Industrial	Steel	3%​	2%​	11%​
1898​	Industrial	Sulfur	0%​	33%​	4%​
1898​	Industrial	Tools	0%​	-1%​	10%​
1898​	Luxury	Automobiles	-20%​		-31%​
1898​	Luxury	Coffee	43%​	64%​	24%​
1898​	Luxury	Fine Art	31%​	43%​	51%​
1898​	Luxury	Fruit	9%​	-1%​	15%​
1898​	Luxury	Gold	0%​	0%​	0%​
1898​	Luxury	L. clothes	26%​	15%​	-2%​
1898​	Luxury	L. Furniture	26%​	14%​	12%​
1898​	Luxury	Liquor	6%​	-14%​	-14%​
1898​	Luxury	Meat	8%​	-20%​	6%​
1898​	Luxury	Opium	20%​	15%​	19%​
1898​	Luxury	Porcelain	14%​	-4%​	-5%​
1898​	Luxury	Radios	25%​
1898​	Luxury	Sugar	8%​	42%​	41%​
1898​	Luxury	Tea	43%​	32%​	31%​
1898​	Luxury	Telephones	-2%​		-20%​
1898​	Luxury	Tobacco	6%​	-6%​	4%​
1898​	Luxury	Wine	39%​	44%​	46%​
1898​	Military	Ammunition	0%​	-4%​	-3%​
1898​	Military	Artillery	-2%​	0%​	-6%​
1898​	Military	Ironcloads	37%​		-2%​
1898​	Military	Man-o-Wars	-22%​	6%​	75%​
1898​	Military	Small Arms	-20%​	-18%​	-22%​
1898​	Staple	Clothes	-16%​	-20%​	-31%​
1898​	Staple	Electricity	-13%​	20%​	21%​
1898​	Staple	Fabric	41%​	-35%​	-15%​
1898​	Staple	Fish	-4%​	15%​	6%​
1898​	Staple	Furniture	-47%​	-63%​	-47%​
1898​	Staple	Grain	-9%​	-36%​	-40%​
1898​	Staple	Groceries	14%​	-10%​	-6%​
1898​	Staple	Paper	2%​	-8%​	-13%​
1898​	Staple	Services	-54%​	-47%​	-43%​
1898​	Staple	Transport	-22%​	-11%​	-24%​
1898​	Staple	Wood	-8%​	8%​	10%​

Diamond model: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_model

---

Factor conditions (endowments):

This is one of the most important factors in Victora 3. In the game the access to resources and labour is essential to have the best prices. This is clear for all players as buildings without labour do not produce or buildings with expensive goods are less profitable. This is also the case for skilled labour with qualifications.

In the game, all players have reached for overseas markets to get access to resources and they have successfully reduced the cost for staple and industrial goods. Only luxury goods seems to be expensive but this is intentional as the consumption of these goods is mainly by affluent POPs that can pay for the high price that also benefits the player with more building profitability.

---

Related and supporting industries:

This is simulated in the game by the economies of scale, i.e., having buildings with many levels. This works fine as it gives more productivity.

---

Demand Conditions:

This is simulated in the game by POPs and building demands. However, there is no much differentiation and almost all nations end up having the same or similary demand for goods, at least in the MP games I have been involved.

IMHO, the main culprit is that players build all industries by themselves to cover all the needs, ensuring that resources are available by conquest or colonization. The possible specialization by industry type it is not worth it in terms of price competitiveness. In addition, the risk to depend from trade to access other goods is too great, specially when the AI is not developing. On POPs, the taboos and addiction system does not produce enough differentiation, or I cannot tell.

---

Strategy, structure and rivalry:

There is no competition in the game, the only possibility for a player to enact a competition strategy is to subsidize buildings, thus having products at an artificial low price for lower profitability. Else, all buildings will try to maximize profits.

The other result of competition is innovation and this is enabled by the game through inventions and PM. This is working as intended and simulates the progress of technology that allowed for more productive industries.

---

My Conclusions TL;DR:

• Victoria 3 has all factors in the Diamond Model and it is a very interesting game to play
• Specialization is missing in terms of demand and skills
• Competition is lacking and this allows profits maximization for buildings. This makes Proportional and Graduated taxation very good compared to the other taxation models

 

[Froonk]

Unfortunately allowing intramarket competition with different private holdings, companies and corporations won't be possible because of performance limitations.

However the game still needs a lot of number tuning in general and some more systems, most glaringly financial systems, which may at least add intermarket competition.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Unfortunately allowing intramarket competition with different private holdings, companies and corporations won't be possible because of performance limitations.

Innovation is mostly a function of competition. The game could simulate this by providing more innovation points for the players that foster more competition.

Competition could be simulated by a group of laws against monopolies and trusts that reduce profits from buildings.

 

[Froonk]

Innovation is mostly a function of competition. The game could simulate this by providing more innovation points for the players that foster more competition.

Competition could be simulated by a group of laws against monopolies and trusts that reduce profits from buildings.

It could definitely be abstracted but developers have to be careful with abstraction. It needs to be considered a trade off or it tends to pile up until systems are incoherent.

However performance limitations are definitely the one of the easiest ways to argue for when abstraction is needed. I definitely think laws and modifiers regarding competition could be good.

As for innovation, perhaps a modifier for having goods produced from multiple different states, which could be counter-balance to stacking buildings in same province for throughput bonus being optimal play every time. It is an imperfect solution since the industries often competed in same regions but at the very least it could add more dynamism to especially large markets.

Still, I believe financial systems are most important even for this. Game is incomplete without representing capital accumulation and core-periphery relations.

 

[GrafKeks]

Unfortunately allowing intramarket competition with different private holdings, companies and corporations won't be possible because of performance limitations.

And because the game's abstraction level is focused on sectors of producers not single instances, and quality differences in goods are not modelled etc. There is a far higher hurdle than simply a lack of consumer compute.

However the game still needs a lot of number tuning in general and some more systems, most glaringly financial systems, which may at least add intermarket competition.

Given that the game aims for sector-level, and abstracts quality as quantity, the production side is more or less finished/would require a different system/s. There is intermarket competition on the national level between all buildings on the labour market anyway.

Innovation is mostly a function of competition.

Not even remotely proven, especially the mostly part. If you said one of many possible drivers that depending on the environment can lead to then yes, it appears quite often as a possible driver in literature.

The game could simulate this by providing more innovation points for the players that foster more competition.

Innovation points are used for research and development and there is barely truly private research ( depends on the definition of private, if specifically only the de-jure owner is meant then there is a lot of private research paid for and initiated by instances not related to the owner/s )

Competition could be simulated by a group of laws against monopolies and trusts that reduce profits from buildings.

Buildings are sectors in the game, hence they work via employment as we are in a quasi-perfect market the sectors go towards competitive equilibrium.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Innovation points are used for research and development and there is barely truly private research ( depends on the definition of private, if specifically only the de-jure owner is meant then there is a lot of private research paid for and initiated by instances not related to the owner/s )

Agreed. Research can be done in universities while commercial applications are developed by private businesses.

Buildings are sectors in the game, hence they work via employment as we are in a quasi-perfect market the sectors go towards competitive equilibrium.

I do not see how the game simulates the competition between many providers to attract consumers. The game operates like a monopoly.

 

[Secret Master]

IMHO, the main culprit is that players build all industries by themselves to cover all the needs, ensuring that resources are available by conquest or colonization. The possible specialization by industry type it is not worth it in terms of price competitiveness. In addition, the risk to depend from trade to access other goods is too great, specially when the AI is not developing. On POPs, the taboos and addiction system does not produce enough differentiation, or I cannot tell.

Interesting.

I was about to make a reply that said, "Your players are obviously not making use of opium and wine obsessions in their games." But now you have me genuinely curious about something in your MP games. Looking at the demand data you posted about wine and opium, I have to ask some questions:

1) A lot of Qing looks like it wasn't conquered or added to a market. Do you have any MP games where China is essentially carved up completely by the players? I'd like to see the opium data in that case. In SP, when I've either played China myself or conquered huge chunks of it, there's a ton of opium demand that doesn't exist when China's POPs have a low SOL.

2) It looks like France has the lowest grain prices and the highest wine prices. Am I correct in assuming that France has a lot of wheat farms? And, if so, am I correct in assuming that the French player is able to keep those wheat farms working with ridiculously low grain prices because the money made on wine is keeping the farms from firing people thanks to low grain prices?

If my assumptions about France in your game is true, then I would argue that the extra wine demand is having a measurable economic impact by providing an effective subsidy of grain production since wine only comes from wheat farms. In fact, that's why I've asked the Devs to rethink wine. Right now, wine is ironically an economic lever to subsidize lower grain prices with all the attendant economic effects on other industries from having low grain prices.

 

[Diskianterezh]

Interesting.

I was about to make a reply that said, "Your players are obviously not making use of opium and wine obsessions in their games." But now you have me genuinely curious about something in your MP games. Looking at the demand data you posted about wine and opium, I have to ask some questions:

1) A lot of Qing looks like it wasn't conquered or added to a market. Do you have any MP games where China is essentially carved up completely by the players? I'd like to see the opium data in that case. In SP, when I've either played China myself or conquered huge chunks of it, there's a ton of opium demand that doesn't exist when China's POPs have a low SOL.

2) It looks like France has the lowest grain prices and the highest wine prices. Am I correct in assuming that France has a lot of wheat farms? And, if so, am I correct in assuming that the French player is able to keep those wheat farms working with ridiculously low grain prices because the money made on wine is keeping the farms from firing people thanks to low grain prices?

If my assumptions about France in your game is true, then I would argue that the extra wine demand is having a measurable economic impact by providing an effective subsidy of grain production since wine only comes from wheat farms. In fact, that's why I've asked the Devs to rethink wine. Right now, wine is ironically an economic lever to subsidize lower grain prices with all the attendant economic effects on other industries from having low grain prices.

Hi there, I'm the France player

To answer your several questions :

1) Qing is obviously a bit cake for everyone to share and as such it is an objective we all keep an eye on. Qing got progressively dismantled, but with restrain and patience. When the Opium war started, i jumped in to seize a trade port : it is cheap in Infamy and gave us access to a big market for silk or other early essential goods to pump. I used the early Infamy on better objectives in Europe and Africa, later we seized some south China part, and stopped here. Russia chose to progressively eat large chunk of Manchuria, which raised aggro of everyone, and thus got heavily coalitionned by everyone when they tried to eat more. So China is important, this is why everyone passively like an independant China more than vassalized by one of the giant.

2) At that point wine was the only good that bottlenecked the SoL of my pops, so i heavily invested in grains indeed to make more wine. For the wine price to be reasonable, we need the grain to be profitable, thus i used the fact that Russia was in Laissez-faire to freely send my grain there and wherever i could. Furthermore, the fact that coffee or tea was not that developped in my market helped wine to stay on top. So indeed grain is a key part of the economy at this point and i have an incredible amount of them.

 

[Secret Master]

2) At that point wine was the only good that bottlenecked the SoL of my pops, so i heavily invested in grains indeed to make more wine. For the wine price to be reasonable, we need the grain to be profitable, thus i used the fact that Russia was in Laissez-faire to freely send my grain there and wherever i could. Furthermore, the fact that coffee or tea was not that developped in my market helped wine to stay on top. So indeed grain is a key part of the economy at this point and i have an incredible amount of them.

Thanks for the information.

The stuff about China makes sense.

Regarding wine:

It seems like my hypothesis was mostly correct. French obsession with wine skewed supply and demand the French market and somewhat dictated your decisions because wine and grain are inexorably linked.

Related question about French agriculture:

Did you use any labor saving PMs on French grain farms (most of which were wheat I'm guessing)? I assume the answer was probably no except for hand tools, but I'm genuinely curious.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Interesting.

I was about to make a reply that said, "Your players are obviously not making use of opium and wine obsessions in their games." But now you have me genuinely curious about something in your MP games. Looking at the demand data you posted about wine and opium, I have to ask some questions:

1) A lot of Qing looks like it wasn't conquered or added to a market. Do you have any MP games where China is essentially carved up completely by the players? I'd like to see the opium data in that case. In SP, when I've either played China myself or conquered huge chunks of it, there's a ton of opium demand that doesn't exist when China's POPs have a low SOL.

2) It looks like France has the lowest grain prices and the highest wine prices. Am I correct in assuming that France has a lot of wheat farms? And, if so, am I correct in assuming that the French player is able to keep those wheat farms working with ridiculously low grain prices because the money made on wine is keeping the farms from firing people thanks to low grain prices?

If my assumptions about France in your game is true, then I would argue that the extra wine demand is having a measurable economic impact by providing an effective subsidy of grain production since wine only comes from wheat farms. In fact, that's why I've asked the Devs to rethink wine. Right now, wine is ironically an economic lever to subsidize lower grain prices with all the attendant economic effects on other industries from having low grain prices.

You are right. If we plot prices vs demand per market we can see that the French Market has 5x demand for Wine than the Russian or American Market. One would think that this subside will make French grain very cheap but the price level is similar to the Russian Market. As @Diskianterezh has explained in his post, he is selling excess of grain to Russia.

French and Russian Market grain balance:

On the other hand, the American Market has more expensive grain because they have less wheat farms, probably because they have enough production of wine for their pops demand. Thus, POPs obsession effectively is affecting gameplay.

About Opium, the same applies. The most pops with opium obsession, the more demand for that good compared to other markets. The player increases its production to keep up with demand.

However, Han have obsession for two substitutes intoxicants: liquor and opium, dividing their demand.

Spoiler: Luxury Goods, Basic Foods and Intoxicants substitutes per Market

Spoiler: Data Table

Good	American Market Demand	American Market Price	Russian Market Demand	Russian Market Price	French Market Demand	French Market Price
Coffee	33700​	43%​	1130​	64%​	16100​	24%​
Tea	16700​	43%​	22800​	32%​	14800​	31%​
Wine	8560​	39%​	8290​	44%​	34400​	46%​
Liquor	42700​	6%​	35400​	-14%​	49800​	-14%​
Tobacco	22300​	6%​	9170​	-6%​	17600​	4%​
Opium	11600​	20%​	6740​	15%​	15900​	19%​
Fish	41500​	-4%​	27300​	15%​	43000​	6%​
Grain	110000​	-9%​	112000​	-36%​	164000​	-40%​
Groceries	75000​	14%​	47300​	-10%​	73800​	-6%​
Meat	19300​	8%​	21600​	-20%​	30200​	6%​
Fruit	19000​	9%​	10600​	-1%​	16000​	15%​

 

[Diskianterezh]

Did you use any labor saving PMs on French grain farms (most of which were wheat I'm guessing)? I assume the answer was probably no except for hand tools, but I'm genuinely curious.

Right now we're all in a building bubble, and lack manpower, so as much labor saving PM as i could. Coal or even engine are cheaper than manpower at this point.

 

[Secret Master]

However, Han have obsession for two substitutes intoxicants, dividing their demand.

Wait, so the Han in your game are obsessed with opium and another intoxicant? That would dramatically impact opium even if you raised the SOL of Han POPs. I see your point here. I do see the Han sometimes picking up liquor and tea obsessions.

I wonder... is there some way to reliably end and start obsessions in specific cultures? If I could guarantee an end to opium obsession and start a liquor obsession (because liquor is made from cheap grain rather than requiring agriculture from specific parts of the world) among Han POPs, I wonder if I could make the world economy work better in both SP and MP.

 

[IsaacCAT]

In fact, that's why I've asked the Devs to rethink wine. Right now, wine is ironically an economic lever to subsidize lower grain prices with all the attendant economic effects on other industries from having low grain prices.

Thinking about it, separating buildings for products has more implications.

If players build up until they reach their internal demand, what will compel them to ‘subsidize’ other products and sell them abroad?

The lack of trade competition maybe the consequence of internal demand being the main player concern. If you eliminate subproducts, the less opportunities for exports.

 

[Secret Master]

The lack of trade competition maybe the consequence of internal demand being the main player concern. If you eliminate subproducts, the less opportunities for exports.

You aren't wrong. But that takes us back to other issues in the economic model of Vic3 that aren't quite doing what we'd like them to do.

Just out of curiosity, do you guys have a save game I could look at? I'm really curious about looking at labor in MP games versus what I see in SP.

 

[IsaacCAT]

You aren't wrong. But that takes us back to other issues in the economic model of Vic3 that aren't quite doing what we'd like them to do.

Just out of curiosity, do you guys have a save game I could look at? I'm really curious about looking at labor in MP games versus what I see in SP.

I will try to send it 2morrow. But @x8ight mentioned that the latest save game was 50Mb. I do not think the forums support this. I will DM you when I get back to my computer.

 

[Secret Master]

I will try to send it 2morrow. But @x8ight mentioned that the latest save game was 50Mb. I do not think the forums support this. I will DM you when I get back to my computer.

Sounds good.

IIRC, the forum should let you post that. But we'll work around it if it doesn't.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Save game from this Sunday. The Russian player couldn't make it this last session.

Summary Table for Human Players 1898-1836

 

[IsaacCAT]

Wait, so the Han in your game are obsessed with opium and another intoxicant? That would dramatically impact opium even if you raised the SOL of Han POPs. I see your point here. I do see the Han sometimes picking up liquor and tea obsessions.

I wonder... is there some way to reliably end and start obsessions in specific cultures? If I could guarantee an end to opium obsession and start a liquor obsession (because liquor is made from cheap grain rather than requiring agriculture from specific parts of the world) among Han POPs, I wonder if I could make the world economy work better in both SP and MP.

Very interesting concept, dynamic demand.

On this regard, I would like to see events that tell the player that X nation is developing its Y industry and requires Z good for some time.

These events will be dynamically created by the game, spotting very low prices in the players nations and increasing autonomous construction for buildings that use that good. This could be a world event and players will be able to compete to supply that good for that nation.

The same should apply for very expensive product in players nations. The game should be able to spot that and build accordingly to export to those nations.

PS: Also I would love to see news of that effort crashing. With all these swings in trade and buildings I am sure that some nations buildings may become unprofitable due to disruption of trade routes by wars or players actions.

 

[GrafKeks]

I do not see how the game simulates the competition between many providers to attract consumers. The game operates like a monopoly.

You are basically at least one abstraction level too low when you think about it(or you search for simulation or emulation when it's abstracted, whcih results in you finding nothing, as it can't be found if it's abstracted away. ).

Assume each building in a state is the aggregate production function of many smaller entities. If you assume the building to be one specific entity then yes it would be a monopoly, what you are viewing is the result of the competition between smaller entities. And each aggregate production function is in quasi competition with the other provinces. This of course leads to different implications regarding inter-state competition as if there was no aggregate intra-state.

If you specifically use simulate then yes you are right it does not simulate that it abstracts it. And it abstracts in such a way that different micro and hence macro implications follow.

Also it's better to think in about market-terms, they are trying to attract demand, not consumers per se. A consumer could buy discrete units from different suplliers, and it's about getting more demand up to maximum profit(whether that's short or long term depends on the suppliers utility in reality/more sophosticated models, as the supplier itself is a combined agent/society of agents not a single instance ) when we are talking reality.

Would it be far far cooler, immersive and closwr to real economies if quality was a factor and there were as little aggregation as possible; definitely yes. As in I am fully on board with your train of thought. But if we forgot how much more compute that costs, we are very likely to make the game literally unplayable. Aggregation allows us to PAC abstract stuff, and the more we abstract the less approximate it becomes for large truly dynamic systems.Hence there is always something to criticize when it comes to realism/economic simulation.

The devs wrote aggregate functions and used them as abstraction, it's not hard to write the constitutent parts, they could have done it; I am even sure they tried less abstraction here and there and that often resulted in the same; absurdly bad performance compared to abstraction or balance hell. IIRC I remember one dev talking about proper local-markets, they tried, and to, honestly, little surprise it was a mess performance and balance-wise. So it got scrapped. And local-markets are nothing in terms of compute or balance compared to allowing full-scale heterogenous production functions.

Like don't get me wrong I complain a lot on these forums too, but I usually am trying to get the rationale behind decisions ( and asking for the rationale directly didn't result in an answer for me so far, yet complaining sometimes works ). In these cases I unfortunately don't even try complaining because I know the trouble from writing small ACE models/sims/programmes, and mine aren't a game i.E there is no UI, there is no me being an agent in them etc. And I also don't have to deal with the other stuff that entails the game, hardware compat etc.

Addendum:I also realized down the line why the devs are unlikely to use a big amount of Matrix calc hardware-wise, the engine needs to deal with it properly, and that means the customer better has a newer GPU and the engine can deal with HIP to use CUDA on the fly etc.

TL;DR: The devs abstracted it, they have to deal with a huge restriction of compute, they ship to consumers that want to play the game rather than wait for a tick to pass. If they'd rewrite the engine such that is fully uses linalg for as much as possible and then allow for more heterogeneity, then there'd be even more people crying about performance( no Hip no Cuda you can barely play it ) and they'd have a hell of a time balancing the game, not that it's already hard enough as it is because there are a lot of temporal dependencies already. The simulation, which is thr backbone of the game takes already a lot of compute as is. A lot of their performance fixesa, at least the ones I read where clamping down on heterogeneity of functions anyway. I.E more assimilation, more conversion, more pop merges. Hell most performance mods just ramp that up by some factor.

Note: I use heterogeneity sometimes as per maths sometimes as in econ.

 

[IsaacCAT]

You are basically at least one abstraction level too low when you think about it(or you search for simulation or emulation when it's abstracted, whcih results in you finding nothing, as it can't be found if it's abstracted away. ).

Assume each building in a state is the aggregate production function of many smaller entities. If you assume the building to be one specific entity then yes it would be a monopoly, what you are viewing is the result of the competition between smaller entities. And each aggregate production function is in quasi competition with the other provinces. This of course leads to different implications regarding inter-state competition as if there was no aggregate intra-state.

If you specifically use simulate then yes you are right it does not simulate that it abstracts it. And it abstracts in such a way that different micro and hence macro implications follow.

Also it's better to think in about market-terms, they are trying to attract demand, not consumers per se. A consumer could buy discrete units from different suplliers, and it's about getting more demand up to maximum profit(whether that's short or long term depends on the suppliers utility in reality/more sophosticated models, as the supplier itself is a combined agent/society of agents not a single instance ) when we are talking reality.

Would it be far far cooler, immersive and closwr to real economies if quality was a factor and there were as little aggregation as possible; definitely yes. As in I am fully on board with your train of thought. But if we forgot how much more compute that costs, we are very likely to make the game literally unplayable. Aggregation allows us to PAC abstract stuff, and the more we abstract the less approximate it becomes for large truly dynamic systems.Hence there is always something to criticize when it comes to realism/economic simulation.

The devs wrote aggregate functions and used them as abstraction, it's not hard to write the constitutent parts, they could have done it; I am even sure they tried less abstraction here and there and that often resulted in the same; absurdly bad performance compared to abstraction or balance hell. IIRC I remember one dev talking about proper local-markets, they tried, and to, honestly, little surprise it was a mess performance and balance-wise. So it got scrapped. And local-markets are nothing in terms of compute or balance compared to allowing full-scale heterogenous production functions.

Like don't get me wrong I complain a lot on these forums too, but I usually am trying to get the rationale behind decisions ( and asking for the rationale directly didn't result in an answer for me so far, yet complaining sometimes works ). In these cases I unfortunately don't even try complaining because I know the trouble from writing small ACE models/sims/programmes, and mine aren't a game i.E there is no UI, there is no me being an agent in them etc. And I also don't have to deal with the other stuff that entails the game, hardware compat etc.

Addendum:I also realized down the line why the devs are unlikely to use a big amount of Matrix calc hardware-wise, the engine needs to deal with it properly, and that means the customer better has a newer GPU and the engine can deal with HIP to use CUDA on the fly etc.

TL;DR: The devs abstracted it, they have to deal with a huge restriction of compute, they ship to consumers that want to play the game rather than wait for a tick to pass. If they'd rewrite the engine such that is fully uses linalg for as much as possible and then allow for more heterogeneity, then there'd be even more people crying about performance( no Hip no Cuda you can barely play it ) and they'd have a hell of a time balancing the game, not that it's already hard enough as it is because there are a lot of temporal dependencies already. The simulation, which is thr backbone of the game takes already a lot of compute as is. A lot of their performance fixesa, at least the ones I read where clamping down on heterogeneity of functions anyway. I.E more assimilation, more conversion, more pop merges. Hell most performance mods just ramp that up by some factor.

Note: I use heterogeneity sometimes as per maths sometimes as in econ.

Thank you. But even in an aggregate model, competition would play a part by eroding profits.

From high prices when there are fewer companies that can produce a good, to lower prices when many companies compete for market share by reducing margins.

You imply competition is abstracted but no effects can be seen ingame. One would expect a variation of profits with time/market conditions.